


Green-Eyed Monster

by brazenlyunabashedlyshamelessly



Series: White Picket Fence Fantasies [2]
Category: Shameless (US)
Genre: Fluff, M/M, i don't know how i feel about this one, i think i may have inadvertently ripped off 3x0666, sorry about that
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-09-30
Updated: 2014-09-30
Packaged: 2018-02-19 09:28:34
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,572
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2383304
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/brazenlyunabashedlyshamelessly/pseuds/brazenlyunabashedlyshamelessly
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Some future fic. I'm having anxiety attacks about season 5 so this is me comforting myself. No matter what happens next, at least we have fanfic.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Green-Eyed Monster

**Author's Note:**

> Firstly, I'd like to thank im-not-his-keeper for the suggestion that Ian be a personal trainer. It fits much better into the story than my teacher idea. Secondly, I'd like to apologise in advance to those people who hate the tendency to fixate on an aspect that's only been mentioned once or twice on the programme. I just took it from my own experience with food, that if I don't know what else to make, I revert to my old faithful whatever. That's what happened with the pizza rolls.
> 
> As ever, comments are more than welcome. I'd love to hear what you guys think.

Mickey Milkovich did not play well with others. It was a well-established fact. He didn’t share well, and to say he wasn’t a “people person” would be to play down his general antipathy towards people who weren’t Mandy or Ian. But, since life wasn’t fair and he had to deal with others, Mickey had made the effort to work on his people skills. He’d never be Mr Social Butterfly, life of the party.

But he’d gotten better at some things. Like, he could stand to be around Ian’s family, although he tried really hard not to be alone with Lip. Smug fucker made his teeth hurt. But he liked Debbie okay, and Carl reminded him of himself at that age, which was both entertaining and unsettling. And, at the garage where he’d been working for the last year, he even managed to avoid decking any of his colleagues. 

So, progress, right? Mickey was trying. He was playing nice with the other kids; he was learning to be more sociable.

Only, there was one thing Mickey had never been able to improve about himself, and that was the ability to share. See, Mickey didn’t get possessive over a whole lot. He’d grown up in a family of six kids, so they’d had to pass shit around to survive. But when Mickey considered something his, it was fucking his, and god help whatever asshole who made the mistake of thinking he’d share.

That was what Mickey had walked in on this afternoon.

He and Ian had had plans for lunch because that’s what boyfriends did sometimes. They went to each other’s place of work, then went out and got food, ate it together, and then went back to doing their jobs. Mickey had found, much to his own surprise, that he liked doing the boyfriend thing. It was probably because of all the time he’d spent in the closet in his younger years, but doing normal, everyday shit was freeing.

Feeling upbeat at the idea that he and Gallagher were going to be doing boyfriend things, Mickey’d walked into the fancy “health club” expecting to find the other man waiting for him. Gallagher knew how uncomfortable the place made him; folks looked at Mickey like they thought he was there to hold the place up.

Not wanting to wait around, in case some genius decided to call security, Mickey made his way over to where Gallagher normally worked. He figured the other man was running late with a client. No biggie. Mickey would just go find him, and wait for him to finish up.

And that was when Mickey almost lost his shit, right there in the place rich folks went to sweat.

Mickey didn’t really know what Gallagher’s job entailed. He understood the basic gist of it—tell fat people to get off their asses and do jumping jacks, or whatever, convince people to stop trying to eat their problems—but he’d never been all that interested in the details.

Until he saw that instead of some chubby chick, Gallagher was working with some asshole that looked like he belonged on the cover of Men’s fuckin’ Health. The guy was tanned and lean and blond, and he was doing some stretch which apparently required Ian’s help. Mickey could hear the guy letting out the occasional, “Oooh, yeah”, and “That feels good”. 

But it was the little moan right at the end, like someone was sucking him off, that snapped the slender threads of Mickey’s temper. 

Striding forward, ready to leave a boot in the guy’s ass, Mickey headed over towards where Ian and the aspiring porn star were working. Something made Gallagher look up. Their eyes met, and whatever the redhead saw there was obviously not encouraging. 

Ian jerked himself upright, and spoke to Mr Desperately Seeking a Beating in a cheerful voice.

“Jake, I think we may have overrun our session this week. So, uh, keep up the good work and I’ll see you soon.”

With that, Gallagher hurried away from Jake, and halted in front of Mickey. The other man put a hand on Mickey’s chest and gently began herding him away from the potential crime scene.

“Keep calm, don’t freak out,” Ian entreated quietly.

Mickey let Ian steer him away, but he was grinding his teeth. The temptation to skirt around Gallagher and warn the handsy fucker to keep his goddamn mitts to himself if he wanted to keep ‘em was almost more than he could take. But this was Ian’s job, and they needed the money now that they were in their own place.

Ian had finally gotten them far enough away that there was no chance of Jake overhearing them. 

“I know what that looked like—”

“Do ya?” Mickey interrupted sarcastically.

“—and you don’t need to worry,” Ian continued calmly. “He’s over the top and inappropriate, but he gives good tips. I can’t afford to piss him off.”

Mickey tried to take a few deep breaths, but the irritation was winning out. The words escaped before he could stop them.

“Thought you stopped lettin’ people grope you for a couple of bucks.”

Fuck.

Ian’s expression hardened and he took his hand off Mickey’s chest. For the barest second, Mickey saw hurt flickering in Ian’s eyes before it was gone.

“I don’t need to explain myself to you,” the other man told him sharply. “I’m doing my job. And while you may not like what that involves, you’ve never had a single goddamn thing to say about the cash it brings in.”

With that, Ian turned his back and stalked off.

Mickey felt the sharp bite of regret as he watched the redhead walk away from him. The crack he’d made had been a low blow; and to compare what Ian’d been doing before he’d gone on his meds to what he was doing now, was a dick move.

Finally finding his tongue, Mickey called after his pissed off boyfriend, “Ey, I thought we were doin’ lunch.”

“Not hungry,” came the terse reply.

Mickey rubbed his hands over his face and swore harshly. Gallagher was mad as hell right now, and who could fuckin’ blame him? Mickey wanted to go after him, but he knew that his boyfriend probably didn’t want to look at him, and might end up kicking his ass. Which he deserved, but might get Gallagher in trouble with his boss.

So Mickey left the health spa with his tail between his legs, and spent the rest of the day stewing. He needed to come up with some way to apologise to Ian, and he needed to make it good. Gallagher didn’t normally get too worked up by Mickey’s bluster, but this time Mickey had crashed into that particular sore spot with all the subtlety of a line backer. 

He got home before Gallagher that night. It was quiet without the redhead around. Usually, when Ian got there first, there was music playing or the TV would be on. The other man was responsible for dinner, because they both knew that Mickey couldn’t cook for shit, and sometimes he got adventurous. The other night, he’d made some spicy shrimp thing that had damn near killed Mickey. He’d just barely managed to keep from choking and spluttering as the stuff had almost burned a hole in his goddamn tongue.

The redhead had asked if Mickey liked it. And, seeing the hopeful look on Gallagher’s face, Mickey had lied his ass off.

Sparing a brief moment to wish that that diplomacy had been with him this afternoon, Mickey set to work. Tonight, he was gonna make dinner. That probably wouldn’t be enough to get Gallagher to forgive him, but it’d be a start. Normally, his culinary skills were limited to pizza rolls, or mac and cheese. But, since he was grovelling, he’d decided on spaghetti. Because not even he could fuck up something so simple.

Except, apparently, he could.

Mickey didn’t know how the fuck it’d happened, but steam had started coming out of the goddamn pot where he’d put the friggin’ noodles, and the piece of shit smoke alarm had started blaring. 

This, of course, was the exact moment that Ian decided to walk through the front door. Mickey glanced up and met his boyfriend’s bemused stare across the apartment.

Cussing up a storm, Mickey tried to do something, anything, to save what was quickly becoming the most disastrous attempt at cooking in the history of the fuckin’ world. Ian didn’t hesitate; he immediately came over to help, making Mickey wanna cringe. Instead of makin’ less work for Ian, Mickey had just given him another mess to clean up.

It took a while, but they finally managed to get the smoke alarm to shut up. Dinner was... well, Mickey thought calling it a “fuck up” would be generous. He almost felt bad about throwing it in the trash, knowing that the poor schmuck who was gonna collect the garbage might have to deal with the mess.

Mickey let out a little huff, and ran a hand through his hair. Hesitantly, he glanced in Gallagher’s direction. The redhead was leaning against the kitchen table and he hadn’t said anything, which had Mickey nervous. If there was one thing he could count on, it was his boyfriend’s non-stop chatter. 

“Ian...” he started, but the other man apparently didn’t want to hear it. Shoving away from the table, Ian stalked out of the kitchen towards their bedroom. Okay, still pissed. And the fiasco with the food obviously hadn’t helped either.

Following his boyfriend, Mickey headed to their room. Gallagher had already started stripping out of his work clothes; his movements were jerky and impatient. Unable to help himself, Mickey took a moment to admire the sight of the muscles flexing in Ian’s back. His fingers itched to touch the smooth skin, to trace the tattoo on the other man’s right side.

Knowing he was pushing his luck, Mickey came up behind Ian and wrapped his arms around the other man’s waist. He felt the redhead stiffen for a moment before he relaxed into the contact. Encouraged, Mickey rested his head against Ian’s and just savoured the fact that he could touch his boyfriend like this; they didn’t have to worry about people barging in on them, or having to keep quiet. 

“I’m sorry,” he murmured finally.

“About dinner?” Ian asked flippantly. “Yeah, that probably wasn’t the best idea.” Gallagher made to pull away from him, so Mickey tightened his grip around the other man’s waist.

“Not about the food. Well, yeah, that too. But mostly I’m sorry about what I said earlier. That was bullshit.”

Ian’s hands came up before hesitantly resting over Mickey’s. 

“That hurt,” Ian admitted quietly. 

Mickey pressed a kiss to the nape of the redhead’s neck, feeling a fresh wave of guilt wash over him. He reached up to Ian’s freckled shoulders and gently turned him around. The other man was avoiding his gaze, and didn’t that make Mickey feel like a piece of shit?

Mickey stood up on his tiptoes so that he could look Ian in the eyes when he said the words again. He cupped the redhead’s face in his hands and stared at him earnestly.

“I’m sorry. I was an asshole, and I shouldn’t have said what I did.” 

Gallagher’s shoulders relaxed. He finally looked at Mickey, and his lips twitched into a faint smile. 

“You apologised,” he whispered. That smile widened slightly. “We should go check that it hasn’t started raining frogs or something.”

“Fuck off,” Mickey muttered without heat. He felt a surge of relief at Gallagher’s teasing. He knew the other man would probably still be a little sensitive for a while, but at least he wasn’t mad. His hands drifted away from Ian’s face, and he stepped closer to wrap his arms around the other man once again. Feeling Ian returning the embrace drained all the tension out of him.

“I really am sorry,” he said softly.

“I know,” Ian said.

They stood there in silence for a while. It was one of those silences that had taken Mickey so long to get used to; it wasn’t fraught with tension or unspoken hostility. It was... nice. 

The sound of Ian’s stomach rumbling broke the moment. 

Mickey let go of the redhead, pulling back with a snicker. 

“That bad, huh?” he asked with a smirk.

Ian rolled his eyes.

“We wouldn’t be having this problem if you hadn’t tried to cook and almost set the friggin’ place on fire,” Gallagher pointed out, laughter in his eyes.

Mickey conceded the point with a nod. 

“We’ve got pizza rolls in the freezer—” he started before his boyfriend cut him off.

“You think I’m letting you in the kitchen again tonight?” Gallagher asked him, staring at him like he’d suggested Ian try and get him pregnant. The redhead barrelled on before Mickey could answer. “I will check the fridge for what we can eat, and then I will cook. You have no business going in there for anything but cereal.”

Mickey gave an indignant huff. 

“I can make pizza rolls, asshole.”

Ian gave an unimpressed, “Uh-huh” before heading out of the room.

Mickey trailed after him and watched as the redhead began rifling through the fridge. He shifted uncomfortably before blurting out, “I wanted to make dinner.”

Ian looked up from what he was doing, his brow furrowed slightly in confusion.

“I was a dick earlier,” Mickey said with a shrug. “I thought I’d make it up to you by doin’ the cooking for a change.”

Something about Mickey’s expression must have made it clear to Ian that this was important to him. Ian left their tiny kitchen without comment and made his way towards the living room. Mickey hurried over to the freezer to grab the pizza rolls, so he could feed his boyfriend and maybe redeem himself a little. 

Then, from the other room, he heard Gallagher call out, “Hey, what’d you wanna watch? I was thinking Universal Soldier.”

Mickey felt himself grin.

“Jesus Christ, Gallagher, what is it with you and fuckin’ Van Damme?” he complained.

“I could ask you the same thing about Seagal,” Ian called back.

It didn’t take long to get the pizza rolls done, and by the time Mickey headed over to Gallagher—food in hand—the TV was already on, and the opening credits of Under Siege were rolling.

Mickey didn’t comment on the other man’s choice of movie. They’d watched the damn thing dozens of times, could probably quote it line for line, but it was like... their comfort movie. They knew what was gonna happen, there were no surprises, nothing they hadn’t seen before. Hell, half the time they ended up ignoring it in favour of making out on the couch.

Actually, maybe that was why Gallagher had chosen it. 

Sitting down next to his boyfriend, Mickey prepared to eat and pretend to watch Seagal blow shit up. As the movie progressed, he and Ian inched closer to one another until Ian had draped his arm across Mickey’s shoulders, and Mickey had rested his head on Ian’s chest. 

Once again, Mickey found himself marvelling at being able to do this with Ian. The threesome they’d usually found themselves in, with anxiety or outright fear crowding the bed, wasn’t an issue anymore.

Instead, it was just the two of them.

They were home.

**Author's Note:**

> I had planned for this to be smut, but as I was writing, it didn't feel right to include that in this one. I'll probably do something raunchy at a later date.


End file.
